Southern standard. (McMinnville, Tenn.) 1879-current, 1887-02-05
TO SAVE THEIR LIVES.
Bill Nye Explains Why Boys Leave
the Farm.


the advertising columns of your
magazine, writes Bill Nye to the
Northwestern Miller, the large and
prolific wheat growing lands connect
ed with my estates. My object in
selling these lands is to get them into
the hands of some one who has more
means than / have. The lands are
in a high state of cultivation, but in
order to get the best results, more
machinery is needed next year than
1 feel like purchasing. We need two
new sulky ploughs on the place, two
seeders, new tanning mill, a thresh-
er with traction engine, three reapers
with binders, a cut worm eradicator,
curculio buster, squash bug arrest
or, a Hessian fly detector, a chinch
bug crusher, potato bug assassinat-
or and a steam gopher stabber.
When l started in to. farm, I sowed
sixty acres to wheat, ten acres to oats,
and planted some vegetables. Joint
worms took the grain, cabbage worms
paralyzed the kraut orchard, cut
worms took the tomatoes and melons,
apple worms deveured my choice
Siberian crab apples, and a tapeworm
carried off my hired man.
I then began to see "why our boys
leave the farm"
They do it to save their lives. l
next resolved to abandon the veget-
ables and devote my valuable space
to grain.
bought new team, one member
of which was a ''cribber" while the
other had the "thumps." Before
that / did not know that "thumps"
was contagious disease outside the
prize ring. That fall / had $50 BUSH
els of No. 3 wheat, worth AZ cents in
Minneapolis, a cow that had hollow
horn so that I had to be up half the
night with her, a horse that had the
thumps so he couldn't take a long
breath, and cribber that would
catch hold of hitching post and
suck in so much atmosphere that
everybody in our county gasped for
breath. I said to myself, this is the
reason that boys leave the farm and
go away to business college, where
they learn to make penmanship birds
and capitals with side whiskers or
them.
The past season I decided to grow
wheat on my estate. In June the
crop looked well, but in July, while
Twas engaged one day in sharing
gophers with a pickerel line, 1 motto
ed several small dappled bugs, abou
three twentieths Of an inch in length
playing 81 spy" in the wheat. They
had a peculiar aroma which they car
ried with them to shed in case the,
got stepped on. carried few o
these bugs to friend of mine wht
had been in the farming business al
his life, and asked him what the,
were. He said they were chinch bugs
and that by and by there would b
more of them.
He was right.
Every little while a female chine
bug would come cackling off the mes
and you could find 500 eggs there q
soon as she went away. If 1 watch
ed her carefully with a glass, 1 motto
ed that she would wander about
few minutes, then suddenly she woul
remember something and 60 back t
the nest, where she would lay sc
more eggs. In this way it did NJ
take long to accumulate enoug
chinch bugs so that could suppl
those who had been less fortunat
So I told the other farmers that the
could come over any time and hel
themselves. allowed them to tax
the young bugs, or eggs enough
set their own bugs, just as the
thought best.
In July the chinch bugs were q
thrifty and the wheat was all ripe.
was too early to thrash, so / stacke
my wheat. 1t rained last night wit
great severity. Yesterday / went 0,
to see my stacks. | can do most an
other manual work, but l am not
good stacker. The man who exarni
ed the stacks said that he was su
prised that any rain fell elsewher
1t looked to him rs though the
stacks had gone over the Northwe
and secured all there was. But
consoled me ,agood deal after a
He said it was really no loss, for Il
grain itself was nothing but stra
with little dash of bran in it. n
wheat lands are now for sale. Icou
a,-r,, thor, ,,o,,coIF &c Rs1I Ill -